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Poison Apple

So, I had planned to kick off the new year with a recent recipe for a coffee based drink inspired by a favorite drink of my favorite fictional assassin that I made for the first time recently to high praise from someone what is arguable a bigger fan of both coffee and Vlad Taltos than I, which is saying something. While that post will be coming, you’ll have to wait until next month, as inspiration for another drink hit me today.

As I was driving in to work this morning, I was struck by an idea for this cocktail. As to what it says about how things are currently going at the office that I was thinking of cocktails before my work day had started, well, I’ll leave you to draw your own conclusions. The point is, I was thinking of absinthe in particular, and how maybe a nice Corpse Reviver #2 would be a good way to celebrate the end of the day once it shambled around. Now, I love the Corpse Reviver #2, but of course my mind started working through permutations of it, and what it was about that drink that I was craving.

When it came down to it, I was looking for that hint of absinthe, and the crispness of the citrus. What I didn’t really want was the tartness, but something lighter. I started thinking of flavors that I like to put with anise, and thought of doing a gin drink heavily laced with rose water, but that didn’t intrigue me. I moved on to apples, and that’s where I dwelt for most of the rest of the drive. The crispness and natural sweetness of apples works so very well with absinthe, and while I went through many ideas, I ended up settling on this really quite simple recipe:

2 parts applejack or calvados

1/2 part simple syrup

1 barspoon of absinthe

1/4-1/3 of an apple

lemon juice

Upon arriving home, I told my darling wife about this cocktail idea, and shared that I even had a name for it already, which is surprising as I usually struggle with naming my creations. After telling her about the idea, she shared that thanks to a trip to the grocery store earlier today, we had some nice fresh apples in the fridge, which I took as a sign, and set off to cobbling this first experimental glass. I must say, I am well pleased with the results, if I do say so, as was the wife.

I started by thinly slicing up some apple, in this case a Kiku apple, which is a variety we hadn’t tried before. Honestly, I couldn’t have asked for a better apple for this cocktail; it’s quite juicy, very sweet, but with a nice light tartness. After cutting the apple into suitably thin pieces, I muddled that in a Boston shaker with a bit of fresh lemon juice, about what you’d get from 1/8th of a medium lemon. I kept muddling until I had worked as much juice out of the apple pieces without completely pulverizing them. To this I added some crushed ice, the applejack, absinthe, and after sampling a bit more of the apple and deciding it was going to make for a decently sweet drink, the small amount of simple syrup. I shook the drink briefly to chill it and let some of that crushed ice melt down, and then strained it into a coupe glass for service.

What I had in that glass was a lovely little drink; very light, with an almost floral sweetness from the apple, and the nice clean finish of absinthe passing fleetingly through the end.